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YOU MUST BELIEVE IN SPRING
Lyrics

When lonely feelings chill

The meadows of your mind
Just think if winter comes
Can spring be far behind?Beneath the deepest snows
The secret of a rose
Is merely that it knows
You must believe in springJust as a tree is sure
Its leaves will reappear
It knows its emptiness
Is just a time of year
The frozen mountains dreams
Of April's melting streams
How crystal clear it seems
You must believe in springYou must believe in love
And trust it's on its way
Just as a sleeping rose
Awaits the kiss of MaySo in a world of snow
Of things that come and go
Where what you think you know
You can't be certain of
You must believe in spring and loveYou must believe in love
And trust it's on its way
Just as a sleeping rose
Awaits the kiss of May
So in a world of snow
Of things that come and go
Where what you think you know
You can't be certain of
You must believe in spring and love
This well-rounded set (released posthumously) features the highly influential
pianist Bill Evans in a set of typically sensitive trio performances. With his
longtime bassist Eddie Gomez and his drummer of the period, Eliot Zigmund,
Evans explores such songs as "We Will Meet Again," Jimmy Rowles's classic
"The Peacocks" and the "Theme from M*A*S*H." It's a solid example of the
great pianist's artistry.

+++++++++++

Bill Evans: Self Confidence and the Unique

Voice
By Marshall Bowden

I've been listening to the Bill Evans Complete Riverside Recordings

box set and thinking about jazz musicians and self-confidence. The
environment of jazz has always been competitive and therefore re-
quired a lot of belief in oneself and what one was doing in order to just
continue to play and develop. Take Miles Davis, a supremely confident
musician if ever there was one. But when Miles first climbed on the
bandstand, was first recording with Charlie Parker, he couldn't really
cut it. It doesn't take more than a cursory listen to those early sides to
realize that Miles was not a gifted bop player. Davis had a couple of
choices: he could woodshed until he became a consummate bop im-
proviser, he could pursue his own style and sound, or he could pack
up and go home. I think there's little doubt about the path he chose.
Bill Evans chose a similar route. Evans doubted his own abilities, par-
ticularly early in his career. Growing up with an alcoholic father cannot
have done much to give Evans a secure sense of self. An avid reader
and one of jazz's most articulate musicians, Evans admitted to an
early lack of confidence in his playing and his vision. Believing that he
lacked the talent of other musicians he listened to, Evans felt he could
make up for the perceived lack of talent by working extremely hard.
He didn't satisfy his professors at Southeastern Louisiana College,
though: they faulted him for not practicing exercises and scales, even
though he was able to master the required pieces with ease. Nonethe-
less, Evans worked to develop his playing over a number of years, ar-
riving at his unique sound and style as the result of learning to chan-
nel his feelings directly into the music. For him, exercises or scales
could not be an acceptable form of development because he would
then lose the emotional immediacy that fed his playing. Indeed, listen-
ing to Evans' playing is much like meditation. You tune in to your own
thoughts very deeply while listening because the music seems to
speak directly to them, at times even seeming to reveal them to you.

Of course, Evans was completely correct in his thought that by pursu-

ing his own path and arriving at his own conception of jazz piano he
was behaving in the most honest and authentic way that a musician
can behave. Certainly, other jazz artists have done the same thing-
Davis, Duke Ellington, Charles Mingus, and Thelonius Monk spring im-
mediately to mind. Mingus and Monk in particular suffered some of the
same difficulties as Evans-self-doubt in the face of commercial indif-
ference to the path they were pursuing, periods of reclusiveness and
depression, and widespread influence on other musicians who appar-
ently missed the point of what they were attempting to accomplish.
This is not to say that all the followers of Mingus, Monk, and Evans
were uniformly attempting to imitate their idols rather than taking to
heart their examples of the power of fiercely independent develop-
ment, but there were many who chose that far simpler path. Interest-
ingly, I doubt any of these musicians sat down with the idea that they
would develop an "individual" style-somehow it was just a given. This
is what Evans had to say about the topic:
"First of all, I never strive for identity. That's something that just has
happened automatically as a result, I think, of just putting things to-
gether, tearing things apart and putting it together my own way, and
somehow I guess the individual comes through eventually…" (Enstice,
Wayne and Paul Rubin. Jazz Spoken Here: Conversations with Twenty-
two Musicians. Baton Rouge, LA: LSU Press, 1992.)
Thelonius Monk was often called egocentric, living in his own universe
in which the world revolved around him. Denzil Best, who worked with
Monk when they were both teenagers, recalls "People would call his
changes wrong to his face. If he hadn't been so strong in his mind, he
might easily have become discouraged, but he always went his own
way and wouldn't change for anything." It's doubtful that Monk saw
his chord progressions as anything but logical and probably wondered
what all the fuss they generated was about. They were the vocabulary
that enabled him to communicate what he wanted to communicate.
The same can be said about Davis' tone, Ellington's insistence on writ-
ing more "serious" pieces, and Mingus' use of humor and unorthodox
voicings in his compositions. All were "wrong" in the eyes of those
around them. All held firmly to the path they were on. Some resorted
to chemical succor or retreated into their own private universe. There
is little doubt that all these artists suffered a period or periods when
there was a severe crisis of self-confidence. Evans, as befitted his
temperament, was more articulate about his. But the demon was
there for all.
Some musicians don't handle pressures of self-expression and the mu-
sic business well, and some of them do fold up their tents and head
home. One such musician was John Hardee. Hardee was a multi-in-
strumentalist who played piano, mellophone, C-melody saxophone,
alto, and tenor sax. He worked with Don Albert as a tenor player be-
fore returning to college. After graduation, he worked as a band direc-
tor in Texas and also played the clarinet in the military band. Hardee
went to New York to pursue his musical career, and worked with Tiny
Grimes from 1946 to 1948. Most of the work he recorded was done on
78 rpm records at the precise time that the LP format was killing off
 78s as the recorded medium of choice. His work wasn't released on LP
and was lost and forgotten for some time, even though his playing put
him on a par with Coleman Hawkins and Ben Webster. So what hap-
pened? Basically a crisis of self-confidence. The jazz scene in New
York was extremely competitive at the time, and Hardee simply didn't
have the stomach for it. He felt that he could have filled the chair va-
cated by Ben Webster in the Duke Ellington orchestra, and the
recorded evidence, now available on CD, supports that assertion. I
strongly recommend either the Chronological Jazz Series release John
Hardee: 1946-1948 or the EMI import John Hardee Swingtettes: Tired.
We're very lucky to have these performances saved and available for
our pleasure. Had Hardee continued to be part of the New York scene
he would undoubtedly have become a major tenor player whose con-
tribution and influence would still be widely discussed. Hardee re-
turned to Texas, teaching in Dallas for most of the rest of his life. No
doubt he passed on a lot of wisdom to the kids who learned music
from him.
What is the point of this discussion? I guess it comes down to the be-
lief that although it's important to listen to a lot of music and absorb
what's been done in the past, it doesn't really matter what the prevail-
ing flavor of the day is if the music that arises from a musician's deep-
est emotions is at odds with that flavor. When swing was the thing,
there were musicians who just didn't play that style because they
didn't feel it. Same with bebop, cool jazz, and every other style to
come down the pike. The other point here is that once a musician has
connected deeply with what he or she is feeling and found the vocabu-
lary and technique necessary to express those feelings, they should
not allow anything to change what they're doing or dissuade them.
That's not to say musicians should do one thing for their entire life or
career. One must continue to develop or there's not much point in ex-
pressing oneself. That impetus for a change of direction needs to
come from inside, to grow organically and be allowed to take the artist
where it will; it can't be dictated by fashion or marketing concerns.

All about Jazz

By: CHRIS M. SLAWECKI
After more than a decade as one of the pianist’s most sym-
pathetic bassists, this was Eddie Gomez’s last recording
with Evans, a trio set with drummer Eliot Zigmund
recorded in 1977 and released after Evans’ death in 1980.
Evans never stopped searching for new ideas. He might be
faulted for repeatedly looking for them in the same tunes,
but this program is quite varied, including Johnny Mandel’s
“Suicide is Painless” (the theme from M.A.S.H. ); Michel
Legrand’s title track; Gary McFarland’s waltz “Gary’s
Theme,” complementing Evans’ own “B Minor Waltz
(For Ellaine),” composed for Evans’ wife; and “We Will
Meet Again (For Harry),” Evans’ tribute to his brother.
In Evans’ hands, melodies and time signatures are often
more whispered, more shadowed, than stated, as inthe
opening “B Minor Waltz (For Ellaine)” and the somber, re-
flective title track, which blossoms, after Gomez’ mid-song
solo, like dogwoods on a mid-May morning. Evans boasted
such a unique, unmistakable touch— emotional and beauti-
ful and even soft, but never sweet. (Gomez is pretty amaz-
ing himself on “M.A.S.H.,” laying down the foundation
rock solid yet pushing the music forward, too.)
Among this reissue’s bonus tracks, “Without a Song” is
about as ebullient as you’ll ever hear this pianist, and

“Freddie Freeloader,” the one track on Miles Davis’ land-

mark album Kind of Blue where Evans did not play,
presents the rare sound of Evans on electric piano.
As a rule, Evans could pick up the program from an ele-
mentary school chorus festival and play it inventively
and beautifully. This set is no exception.
Track Listing: B Minor Waltz; You Must Believe In
Spring; Gary Personnel: Bill Evans - Piano; Eddie Gomez -
Bass; Eliot Zigmund - Drums.
You Must Believe In Spring | Year Released: 2004 | Record
Label: Warner Bros.
Tomkins: A question to start things off— why would you
say the trio formula of piano, bass and drums has been used
so consistently in jazz?
Evans: Well I would say as a pianist that it offers a perfect
musical combination of percussion and timbre and bass,
plus the piano, which is a sort of lead voice with a harmony
or colouristic function. So that you have all the basic musi-
cal functions fulfilled and there are no extra voices There-
fore, for myself, I feel the freedom to shape something and
feel that the fewer people that are responsible for the musi-
cal product, the more pure that product can be. That's about
where I'm with it, I think.
Israels: I have nothing to add to that, except to say that the
answer to that question is: because it sounds good.
Evans: I know that as soon as we've had horn players sit it,
it's been fun, depending on who it was— but immediately
we change our whole approach it becomes more or less a
typical lead-voice-and- rhythm-section-thing. And to get
out of that would be kind of difficult. There are so many
technical musical things that have to be left behind before
you can just relax and play, And like I say, the fewer peo-
ple responsible for staying together in reference to this
thing the freer you can be.
Israels: I thought of a way of doing that. In order to really
mix the horn player in, he would have to learn essential
second lines, in the same way that I learn an essential bass
line, for each of the pieces that we play. And he could be-
come an accompanying voice in that way. On top of that,
he would have to be as flexible as we can be with each
other.
Evans: I think it could be done. But of course, when I
started the idea of trying to get a group together that could
have a more free interplay with each other, the problem
was such that I thought it would be a lot easier to solve
with the trio. Maybe now, if we have a more solid concept
of what we're doing, a sympathetic horn player could be
added.
Bunker: I don't know if your question meant why piano,
bass and drums, as opposed to piano, guitar and clarinet or
some other group of instruments. I think, from my view-
point, that the jazz idiom being what it is, has resolved it-
self down to piano, bass and drums being what is called the
rhythm section. With those three you have a variety and
combination of sounds that you can't necessarily achieve
with other instruments.
I've heard trios without drums and with guitar, which to me
seemed to lack something. Of course, maybe I want to hear
the drums in that context. But there would always be har-
monic considerations and concessions that would have to
be made on the part of both the guitar player and the pi-
anist, in staying out of each other's way— a kind of same-
ness of sound. It wouldn't seem to be capable of quite the
kind of driving, strong kind of swing that you might want
sometimes You certainly have to have a bass. And piano,
bass and horn somehow seems lacking to me, so I imagine
that it's pretty well resolved down to those three instru-
ments. I think it offers each partner the greatest amount of
freedom in what he's doing. Because there's enough differ-
ence in the sound of the instruments that, if some kind of
conflict does happen, it's not that apparent. Whereas, if you
have a guitar and a pianist, if they don't play exactly the
same notes, it will sound discordant to your ear.
Evans: In other words they function too much the same.
Israels: Another trio instrumentation that I used to like very
much was Jimmy Guiffre's original trio, with guitar, bass
and clarinet. That seemed to have an equally successful bal-
ance of functions in it It was even satisfying to me when he
used the trombone instead of the base—but not quite so sat-
isfying as before.
Bunker: There again it's a matter of what the lead voice
will be, in the case of his groups. It was his voice. He was
dictating pretty much the musical policy that would be fol-
lowed by the group. Granted each player has freedom
within the framework, but he decided the framework in
which they would play. And that always has to be done in
any trio, whatever the instrumentation. There is one domi-
nant voice. In the case of our group, it's Bill, of course. I
know drummers who have bands—the two I can think of
right offhand in America are Shelly Manne and Chico
Hamilton—who don't have that much to do with what actu-
ally goes down.
Israels: They ask somebody else to do it.
Bunker: Either the piano player determines some part of
the thing, as far as an arrangement is concerned, or they'll
hire arrangers to write material. In the case of Shelly's quin-
tet it’s sometimes necessary, and good—like the pieces that
were commissioned from Bill Holman and various other
people. But how much can the drummer say—unless he
knows an awful lot about music aside from the drums—
which most drummers do not.
Evans: And then they would have to do it as a verbal thing.
They couldn't do it musically. Which is to me a basic, im-
portant thing about our group— that everything has been
done through the music. And that’s so important to me, be-
cause, as soon as you get outside of it and say "Now the
second chorus we're going to play forte for eight measures
and then we're going to phrase this, and then we'll go into
triplets" and so on— it just has to end up as a pretty false
thing, I think.
Bunker: And there would be no exchange of ideas.
Evans: The whole thing here is that everything has devel-
oped— and certainly not just through me— because the
tunes that we play develop according to how everybody
plays. And, on certain occasions, something different will
happen, without anyone nodding assent to it. And it be-
comes part of the performance thereafter. Not m a strict
way, but in some general way. We still like to leave every-
thing pretty loose. Like, one time in Stockholm I know on
"Round About Midnight' Chuck played such a strong cho-
rus and ended up playing the melody at the end. It seemed
superfluous to go back to another melody chorus. So we've
been playing it that way ever since where Chuck takes it
out, as far as the final melody statement is concerned. And
we never mentioned it before this.
Bunker: People are always asking me: "Do you rehearse
often?" And we've never had one. It's very difficult to ex-
plain to them how it comes about. "How do you know
what's going to happen?" You just know. If you play with
somebody long enough.
Evans: You're already a musician. And you have a certain
experience. We naturally have a sympathy for a similar phi-
losophy in music, I think. We sort of want the same things.
Therefore things can happen— the potential is there, And
it's not a mysterious thing where you're reaching and grop-
ing for something which you know nothing about and div-
ing into an ocean of possibilities. They're real, musical pos-
sibilities based on firm musical facts. And there the free-
dom comes with this group, I think.
Tomkins: And this is the kind of thing you're all striving to-
wards— the result of this feeling for one another?
Evans: I think so. We try to listen as much as possible, and
it’s an ultimate musical result— a qualitative thing. We
want a better musical result and nothing specific. We all
have a feeling for, and respect music fundamentally first.
With that responsibility in mind, I think we sort of strive
naturally for something which is in a similar direction.
Tomkins: All of you have been involved to some extent or
other, with classical music. What bearing has this had on
what you're doing in jazz?
Evans: It would be difficult for me to say specifically, ex-
cept that I've played a lot of classical music and love it, as I
love jazz. And any music that you experienced influences
you to varying degrees— negatively, positively or what-
ever. But the amount of time I've spent with classical music
I must have learned a lot. Because music is music— the
language employed is the same, regardless. Why one
thought follows another is the same throughout all music
which is valid. Therefore you can learn things which apply
to jazz from classical music, which might have no stylistic
relationship. They're fundamental, general principles. I
know I've been influenced that way— and gladly.
Israels: I think we've all been influenced by the extent of
the varieties of musical experience which are available out-
side of jazz. And I think we've all looked for this kind of
variety in our jazz playing. There aren't many other areas in
jazz in which you can find the variety that you can outside.
It’s been a very strong influence for me, anyway, and I
think for Bill and Larry, too.
Evans: The idea is, we're trying to be complete musicians,
and jazz is the tool, or whatever, stylistically.
Israels: Jazz is our style really.
Evans: Yes, and you can put all of your musical experience
into it, if you approach it right.
Bunker: So many times I hate the term `classical'. Then
people say: "Well then, not classical, but `serious' music."
And I can't imagine being any more serious about music
than we are about ours! I haven't been that involved with
classical music, but I've played a lot of contemporary or-
chestral music, particularly written for motion pictures or
television, be it good or bad. I've learned an awful lot about
music from it that I would not have learned in jazz. Yet a
lot of the appreciation for what goes on here can be applied
to jazz Just By having done that, I find myself hungrier to
play jazz. It means more to me. And I can bring something
beside 'tink- a- ting tink- a- ting, tink- a- ting' four- to- the-
bar to the music.
Evans: This is a thing that I've been thinking about for a
couple of years: jazz to me is a certain process of making
music. It doesn't matter about the style. Instead jazz means
a style to people But whether it was written by Stravinsky
or Neal Hefti— if it’s written, it’s not jazz to me. It might
be an approximation of what has been a jazz performance.
But jazz is a 'how' to me. It s performing without any really
set basis for the lines and the content as such emotionally
or, specifically, musically. And if you sit down and con-
template what you're going to do, and take five hours to
write five minutes of music, then it's composed music.
Therefore I would put it in the classical or serious, what-
ever you want to call it, written- music category. So there's
composed music and there's jazz. And to me anybody that
makes music using the process that we are used to using m
jazz, is playing jazz. Chopin or Mozart, or anybody that
made music that way at any time was playing jazz as far as
I'm concerned.
Tomkins: Instant composition, you might call it.
Evans: Yes and according to the era they lived in, they had
their materials and their feelings for music within their cul-
ture. But the process involved was the same. It’s to feel
within an idiom that you've mastered to a certain extent, so
that you can make music happen on the spur of the mo-
ment. And a lot of composers, however successful they
might be, don't have that facility today. And yet, up to a
certain period— I'd say probably the late 1800s— no com-
poser that was worth anything wouldn't be able to do this.
They all had an improvising ability, and most of their com-
posing came out of it. But now that's getting to be a lost art.
Bunker: It’s an art, just like a person in literature who may
be a great writer is not necessarily an extemporaneous
speaker who can get up and propose those same ideas, con-
struct sentences and use syntax and the whole vocabulary
of his craft and language, to express it spontaneously. He
has to sit and work on it, which to me is the same as a com-
poser of music. Whereas we are extemporaneous perform-
ers. We utilise a vocabulary, and an extensive one that
we've acquired.
Israels: As I listen to us discuss this, I'm struck by the lack
of discussion of the framework that we work in. And, as I
discuss our music with for instance orchestral musicians or
with people who are very interested in music, but not tech-
nically aware of this process that we use— they sometimes
get an idea that we don't have any framework.
Evans: Huh that’s funny.
Israels: And I think we kind of owe it to this discussion to
make some mention of the fact that we don't entirely impro-
vise.
Evans: Oh, absolutely. It’s impossible, as far as I'm con-
cerned.
Israels: It might be some idea you could get if you would
imagine a wire framework for a sculpture, just a wire fig-
ure, and three sculptors with a similar point of view, and
with a great deal of understanding for each other, all work-
ing at the same time in putting clay around this wire form
to make a completed sculpture.
Bunker: The skeleton is there and we have a rough idea of
what its general form will take, but not down to a fine de-
tail. Because suddenly something will happen in the midst
of it, as it’s growing, as it s coming together. We'll say:
"No, that should go over here. Take the nose from here and
put it around there," or whatever.
Evans: It’s easy for me to separate what is our reference,
and what is our extemporaneous performance, because our
reference is entirely a theoretical thing practically. And we
have a facility within that theoretical framework. Now ev-
erything else that happens is loose. Even if it happens the
same way for four times, the fifth time it might change.
And this is only really, perhaps on opening and closing
statements that things get rather you know, similar or the
same. But still I want to leave the leeway in my mind en-
tirely to change anything specific that happens in the
framework. And the framework that we play on is a very
rigid and specific thing and we have to know it just as thor-
oughly as possible However, it has nothing to do with de-
tail or line or emotion. Really, it lacks any emotion. It’s
strictly a technical formula.
Then you put your feelings into it and it becomes an alive
thing through the spontaneity of it. I think if a listener isn't
aware of the reference and doesn't know how we are relat-
ing to it, they're missing the fibre and the strength of the
music, whatever it might be And it's a shame I know so-
phisticated and really outstanding people that can't follow
the blues, and don't know where they're at in it, or if some-
body's improvising in a much less or maybe a more com-
plex popular song or something that’s a freer vehicle that
we might use. That is a shame, because really our freedom
is gained from the playing off of it and, say shifting a
whole phrase just a beat off of the strict framework gives
that idea a particular strength of rhythmic tension, that has
everything to do with the music. And if a person isn't aware
of these things, he's going to miss a lot of it.
Bunker: Or if it doesn't sound like it’s related to anything
or it sounds like they made a mistake and' they got out of it
gracefully, which isn't the case.
Evans: It’s not the cloudy, abstract thing that people want
to make jazz. So many legit composers that come into
screen writing or something when they approximate jazz al-
ways make it a fantasy bluesy kind of thing, which is just a
phrase after phrase of unrelated jazz sounds, and all that.
Which to me is really complete hogwash. Because in order
to find this
type of freedom against a strict Framework that everybody
is familiar with requires a hell of a lot of digging, because
it’s such a simple thing. It’s such an obvious thing. It's
much easier to go out into abstraction that relates to noth-
ing, and it’ll sound, in a way, more fascinating at first. But
it really hasn't got any meat to it Israels: At certain points,
I've had certain kinds of musical pressures on me (not in
this group by the way— I'm talking about some other musi-
cal experiences) to play music which didn't relate to any
framework. And I'm told by .others that I do it very well, in
their terms. But I haven't ever had any musical experience
in that area that can come within one per cent of giving me
the pleasure and satisfaction and emotional involvement—
the sense of being really in the music— that I have when I
work within the disciplines that we have kind of chosen as
our language.
Evans: Same here. I've had a few of those experiences, too,
and they've been very successful for what they were.
Bunker: There is a fringe element— the 'new thing' and a
lot of, to me, nonsense going on in New York with no dis-
cipline, with complete anarchy, insofar as adherence to any
rules and the kind of basic, theoretical functions that Bill
mentioned. That may comprise five per cent of the jazz
that’s going on. But all the other 95 per cent adheres to
those principles in some way or the other. However well
they may do it is another point, but that’s what they’re do-
ing.
Tomkins: And there is, in fact, as far as you're concerned,
more freedom by sticking to the rules.
Israels: Absolutely.
Evans: There's absolutely a deeper satisfaction and convic-
tion, because after all, we can do whatever we want in mu-
sic. We have a choice to do another thing and Larry, Chuck
and I don't choose to do it. I mean, I'm willing to change in
the next minute, if that’s the thing to do. But my experience
so far has been that it hasn't given me the satisfaction, even
to work in it. There's no way to approach working in a
completely abstract art.
Bunker: To me it’s like trying to be an architect, and say-
ing: "All right, I'm going to build a building"— with no
cognisance whatsoever of what it’s supposed to be for,
where it's going to be built, what the materials are that it's
to be built of, what its function will be whether it’s going to
have people inside of it doing something or not. It’s like:
"Here's the building." Well that’s pointless. To me there's
no reason for it to exist— unless all of those things are
taken into
account. And if it's done well, then it will be beautiful. It
will be related to where it is. I think something like that ap-
plies in the jazz also.
Israels: There may be a reason for it to exist for the person
who builds it in his mind. But the point is, in terms of our
musical experience, as much as we are not immediately
concerned with the reaction of the audience while playing,
we are all concerned with speaking a musical language
which we have learned and which the world has learned
through history, in order to be understood. None of us is
trying to be misunderstood .
Evans: And it’s an indulgence otherwise. If you go into this
philosophy deep enough you get back to: the most perfect
artist is the infant in the cradle that’s crying and going
through any other natural functions. He's expressing him-
self with the least prejudice. And this is the thing that these
people aim for. They want to get away from civilisation
and they don't want to be influenced by anything. This is
absolutely impossible And why anyhow? You're saying:
"I'm doing this for myself only." I admit I play music for
myself first, but it’s still with a dedication to music— not
with dedication to myself. And it’s a different thing. As
Chuck says I have more respect for a culture that's pro-
duced by two thousand years and billions and billions of
people than a culture that only spans my own lifetime and
experience. I try to get into that and learn from it, and I've
found that it’s been a revelation, continually to find more
and more in it.
Israels: These total improvising musicians claim to be
reaching for human expression. But, in fact, if you look at it
from the point of view that we're discussing, what they are
achieving by going in this direction is a less than complete
human expression. And what we are looking. for is the
most complete human expression that we can find, by try-
ing to span as much human experience as we can. Which
means that we do not throw away all the things that we, as
human beings, have learned about musical communication
in the last three or four centuries.
Evans: We try to gather as much of it in essence as possible
and apply it to as pure an expression as possible.
Israels: I don't think we're conscious of it in any immediate
way. I don't want to give the impression we're thinking
about this while we re playing. But it does direct our musi-
cal point of view.
Bunker: It underlies what we do.
Evans: Let’s put it this way: I was already well on my way
to being a professional musician and was a successful one
already before I even began to think or talk about subjects
like this And, even now, our conversation about this, I
think probably has no direct relationship to our own musi-
cal accomplishments or functions It’s only that we're get-
ting outside of ourselves and trying to describe something
about our own history and beliefs. But these beliefs are
more fundamental than our conversation.
Israels: They have happened to the three of us in a very
spontaneous way. This is just naturally the way we feel
about music.
Evans: So whatever ambitions you have, or whatever striv-
ings you make, or energy in the direction of accomplish-
ment it comes from something other than a philosophy of
music. It's something that we don t know anything about If
anybody comes up to us and says: "Should I play jazz?" —
this is a funny question, because you couldn't say yes or no
because you'd be condemning them to what would be a
miserable life, if they're not compelled to do it. Being com-
pelled to it, it’s a sheer pleasure, regardless, because, if it
isn't, you go in another direction. But otherwise you
couldn't make a decision like that.
Bunker: People have asked me that and I've ended up say-
ing: "If you don't have to— don't. Only do it if there's noth-
ing else for you to do." Because I'm sure it’s been that way
with all of us Tomkins: It’s a kind of instinct that you can't
put your finger on.
Israels: Well, I think we do put our finger on it very well
when we get involved in discussing it in an intellectual way
like this. But we put our finger on it historically, not on the
impulse that creates it.
Evans: You couldn't direct your life that way. You'd go
batty very quickly I think— if you tried to direct your life
intellectually. At least, that’s what I've found.